Detroit Pistons trade possibilities: Ranking the likelihood, from 1-14, of who gets dealt

AP PhotoDetroit Pistons forward Austin Daye might be the most likely player on the team to be dealt before the NBA's March 15 trade deadline.

AUBURN HILLS – The NBA's trade
market bursts open today, with two weeks of dealing to ensue, and the
timing of Detroit Pistons owner Tom Gores' appearance at two home
games this week was intriguing, if nothing else.

The first-year owner didn't speak
to media, despite multiple requests, and there certainly is the
possibility that the timing of his visit was happenstance.

Still, as Gores huddled with Joe
Dumars, the Pistons' president of basketball operations, during
Wednesday's win over the Charlotte Bobcats, it was difficult to
imagine that trade scenarios didn't enter the discussion.

Gores is a first-year owner of a third-tier team. Dumars won a championship as a general manager but
hasn't made a trade in three years, was handcuffed by a trade freeze
during the ownership transition, and might just be ready to go Monty
Hall over the chance to make the big deal of the day.

On the other hand, the Pistons
aren't willing to trade away their future, bad contracts are hard to
trade because no one else wants them either, and the probability is that any trade before the March 15 deadline will be minor, if one happens at all.

In short, the Pistons won't trade
the players other teams want, and perhaps can't trade the players
they might like to move.

Also, NBA trades are tricky.
Trade scenarios make for interesting conversation until muted by
salary-cap realities. You can't just make a deal without balancing the payrolls.

The newly created ability to trade
more than 100 players who couldn't be dealt until March 1 because of
lockout-induced rules adjustments – about one-fourth of league
rosters – might be the contractual key to unlock the trade gates
with cap-happy formulas.

Yet, until today, all but four
Pistons were eligible to be traded, and there hasn't even been a
decent rumor, much less an imminent trade.

Two Pistons became eligible for
trade today. One has only a six-day trade window, which won't begin
until March 10.

And one Piston can't be traded at
all.

So who might get traded?
From most likely to least likely, here's one theory:

Austin Daye – He's young,
he has size, and there is plenty of room on his frame to put on
muscle, if he does the work. Some GM is liable to make a reasonable
offer for a $3 million player, based on promise and a hunch that
Daye's physical growth was stunted by the lockout. Dumars has dealt
away young first-rounders before, and with Daye out of the playing
rotation, he could do it again.

Will Bynum – The Pistons
have too many point guards. Bynum is a $3.5 million veteran who
could help a team with too few point guards, assuming that team wants
a backup who creates his own offense.

Jason Maxiell – He has
been arguably the Pistons' most steadying presence and his insertion
into the starting lineup at power forward has smoothed out both the
first-unit and second-unit rotations. So why trade him? Because
he's 29, near peak value, earns about the NBA average at $5 million,
and the Pistons can draft his replacement.

Charlie Villanueva – There
is no player Pistons fans would like to see traded more than
Villanueva, who has played six minutes this season. With the promise
that he could return soon from his ankle injury, another team might
be willing to take a flier on a 6-foot-11 shooter, and any team
looking for playoff help is more likely to pursue him than Daye, if
convinced of his health. But then comes the question of whether
Villanueva's $8 million salary next season is prohibitive.

The Pistons probably would swap
Villanueva for scraps, just to avoid an offseason decision on whether
to exercise their one-time amnesty clause (under which they can
release one player and eliminate him from their salary cap, though
they still must pay him, minus any money he receives by signing with
another team), or the stretch provision (under which they can release
a player and spread his contract over several seasons to mitigate the
cap hit).

Tayshaun Prince –
One of two Pistons who became eligible for trade today, because
of a lockout-altered formula under which last offseason's unrestricted free agents
can't be traded until two months after they signed their contracts,
or March 1, whichever is later. Prince could add real value to a
contender, particularly in a time-share, non-mentoring role. He's
still a capable defender. But the Pistons committed to him in the
offseason as their veteran cornerstone, so trading him would mark a
quick change in philosophical direction.

Walker D. Russell –
Again, the Pistons are overstocked at the point, and Russell is a
29-year-old rookie on the cheap. The New York Knicks reportedly, and quietly, hoped to snag Russell and cut Jeremy Lin, until the Pistons opted to keep him. The Knicks came out of that all right, but Russell's
veteran presence and playmaking has been noticed, and someone might
want him as a throw-in trade element.

Vernon Macklin – He is a
25-year-old, second-round rookie who hasn't cracked the rotation
despite the Pistons' revolving door at power forward, on a team
looking ahead to a draft rich in big men. If the Pistons happen to
work out a multi-player deal with a team that sees Macklin as a
project, he could get packaged to make the cap numbers work.

Damien Wilkins – Like
Prince, became eligible for trade today. And much like Russell and
Macklin, his trade value hinges on a salary in the $1.1 million
range, which might fit a cap deal.

Ben Gordon – Safe bet
that Dumars would swap Gordon's 13-point average and $11 million-plus
salary, which exceeds $12 million next season, for a decent draft
pick. But who wants to pay eight figures to a middling scorer who's
turnover-prone?

Jonas Jerebko – He
can't be traded until March 10, when the three-month period after
signing his new contract expires, as one of a handful of restricted free agents who
signed after the lockout, for a contract valued this year at 120
percent, or more, of last year's contract. Once you get past that
technical rigamarole, the reality is that the Pistons may make a
frontcourt deal, but among that group, Jerebko fits future plans
best. Very unlikely to be traded.

Ben Wallace –He's
37 and retiring. He's the least-concerned veteran as the trade
deadline approaches, because he knows the team won't trade him, and
he jokingly suggested that he wouldn't report to another team anyway.
“All they can do is send me home,” he said. Hey, his career
ends on April 26, he wants it to happen here, and he has a
championship ring. Playoffs would be a nuisance.

Greg Monroe – If
Dumars even tried to trade Monroe, Gores should provide a psychological
evaluation as part of his severance package. Or maybe Dumars would
have to be talked off the top of The Palace after he realized what
he'd done. Don't jump, Joe! It's not happening.

Rodney Stuckey –
So after all of that, why is Stuckey less likely to be traded than
Knight and Monroe? He signed as a restricted free agent on Dec. 19, and because of the three-month provision under the same 120-percent premise as Jerebko, he can't be moved until March
19 – four days after the trade deadline.